From the beloved New York Times bestselling author of The Language of Flowers comes her much-anticipated new novel about young love, hard choices, and hope against all odds. For fourteen years, Letty Espinosa has worked three jobs around San Francisco to make ends meet while her mother raised her children—Alex, fifteen, and Luna, just six—in their tiny apartment on a forgotten spit of wetlands … on a forgotten spit of wetlands near the bay. But now Letty’s parents are returning to Mexico, and Letty must step up and become a mother for the first time in her life.
Navigating this new terrain is challenging for Letty, especially as Luna desperately misses her grandparents and Alex, who is falling in love with a classmate, is unwilling to give his mother a chance. Letty comes up with a plan to help the family escape the dangerous neighborhood and heartbreaking injustice that have marked their lives, but one wrong move could jeopardize everything she’s worked for and her family’s fragile hopes for the future.
Vanessa Diffenbaugh blends gorgeous prose with compelling themes of motherhood, undocumented immigration, and the American Dream in a powerful and prescient story about family.
Praise for We Never Asked for Wings
“Deftly blends family conflict with reassurance: Wings is like Parenthood with class and immigration issues added for gravitas.”—People (Book of the Week)
“This poignant story will stay in readers’ hearts long after the last page. . . . Diffenbaugh weaves in the plight of undocumented immigrants to her tale of first- and second-generation Americans struggling to make their way in America. Moving without being maudlin, this story avoids the stereotypes in its stark portrayal of mothers who just want the best for their children.”—RT Book Reviews (Top Pick)
“Diffenbaugh is a storyteller of the highest order: her simple but poetic prose makes even this most classically American story sing with a special kind of vulnerable beauty.”—Bustle
“[A] gripping, heartfelt exploration of a mother’s love, resilience and redemption.”—Family Circle
“Satisfying storytelling . . . Diffenbaugh delivers a heartwarming journey that mixes redemption and optimistic insight [and] confirms her gift for creating shrewd, sympathetic charmers.”—Kirkus Reviews
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Not as good as her first book..was so looking forward to this but was very disappointed
Very good. Enjoyable.
A world I didn’t know about Mexican immigrants that touched your heart. The family had your emotions up and down and rooting for them all the time.
A mother grows through hardship and some tragedies to become a mother in more than just name.
Great characters. Survival & love made for great reading.
I had a hard time getting in to it.
Enjoyed this. Not a 5 because it isn’t one that will stick with me for years, but a very interesting read.
I don’t know what to say except that many of us can see ourselves in Letty’s struggle. Your situation may be different but that lost feeling of not knowing how to get where you want to be, where you need to be in your life, is something most of us can relate to. Determination and perseverance, if you can hang on, will get you through hard times. Believe it can happen. Each character is well developed and adds to the intensity of Letty’s journey. This story drew me into the character’s lives until I got to the point that I couldn’t put the book down. Real life. Sometimes it can be overwhelming.
We had to read that book, Bless Me Ultima, in school. I did not enjoy… it was rambling and didn’t make sense to me. This is the book that you should have high school kids read if you want a coming of age novel. Even when the coming of age happened a few years later than at the end of High School. I loved all of the characters, flaws and all. I was sad when it ended, I wanted to know what happens after the story was over.
I love this author and this book doesn’t disappoint. I loved the characters and didn’t want the book to end. Very good story.
Though I enjoyed reading this book, I felt there were some undeveloped parts.
At one point, Letty, the main character, spoke to Rick, her boyfriend, and explained her life to him but not to the reader. We know some of the things that happened to her but I felt there was something missing. Letty’s daughter, Luna, seemed to be immature for her age and was not a pleasant character to read about, even at the age of 6. But the reader had to fall in love with Alex, Letty’s son. He was a great character and the polar opposite from his sister. Overall, this book was a good read.
Brings the immigration issue to the forefront of the reader’s mind. Characters are very relatable, young, trusting, smart. Would be a good pick for a book club.
I loved the Language of Flowers, so I was really looking forward to this book. I found it very disappointing, in fact I stopped halfway through and flipped to the end of the book which is something I rarely do unless the story is really bad. I wouldn’t recommend it.
Loved this book. Unique story.
the author took the time to build the characters so you as the reader care what happens to them
Very Good. Read the book in 2 days. Unpredictable. Great characters.
Very predictable – rather heavy.
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What a wonderful insightful book.Right from the get go the author had me hooked about this family. It is a story about generations,coming into motherhood albeit a little late. A grandmothers love for her husband,her grand children and most of all for the lessons that her daughter need to learn about motherhood. It is about adversity and how this family overcomes it by opening their hearts to not only each other,but the characters they become involved with.Out of the probably close to 5,000 books I have owned and read this touches a deep heart string.
Took me places I never would have gone otherwise…